National Park System Benefits From Omnibus Natural Resources Bill

Quite a few units of the national park system will benefit from the president's signing earlier this month of the Omnibus Natural Resources Bill. This hefty package contains 57 bills, some of which adjust boundaries of park units, others that call for studies into potential park units.

Omnibus bills are often a mish-mash of things, and despite the fact that the Section D on "Memorials, Commissions, and Museums" is included under Title III - National Park Service Authorization, many of the provisions of Title III, Section D don't actually impact the National Park Service. In this case, the provision on the "National Quilt Museum" is just to rename an existing Museum of the American Quilter's Society - it won't actually produce involvement by the National Park Service.

The most interesting things that I noticed, is that despite the Administration's request for a moratorium on new National Heritage Areas until Congress better defines exactly what these things are and what they are supposed to be - that Congress seems to nevertheless be plowing ahead with new National Heritage Areas anyways. Without better definition and direction, the whole National Heritage Area concept, with few notable exceptions, seems like just a big distraction for the National Park Service, and an inefficient expenditure of scarce dollars for the Parks.

The other interesting note is the list of Special Resource Studies established by Congress - which is the first step towards becoming a new part of the Park System. At least two of the proposed SRS's appear to be pretty patently not suitable for inclusion in the National Park System - the Soldier's Memorial Military Museum and historic Taunton, MA. Its great that the local Congressmen of these places have such pride in the historic resources of their hometown, but its a shame that scarce Park resources might eventually be appropriated or dedicated to conducting studies on the possibility of a level of recognition for those resources that is at least one level above the recognition that those resources would truly merit.